Hey, you, cis girl that's very (correctly) vocal about women being allowed to talk about their periods, do you include trans women in that?
I ask because every single time I've tried to talk about it to anyone that isn't a trans woman they get fucking angry. Which has caused me to have to just suffer in silence every single month. So I really relate to cis women when they talk about literally the exact same thing; being shamed by everyone around them their whole lives for talking about their periods, so they just suffer in silence every month as it negatively impacts their work and social lives. But I don't even feel like I can voice that I am literally dealing with the same exact thing because most of y'all react like you want to throw me in front of a bus for saying it, even those of you who act like your such big great transfem allies.
I guess I'll take this opportunity to talk about trans women periods. The first thing any tme person thinks when they hear this is always "how can trans women have periods? They don't have uteruses!"
The answer is: the uterus isn't what causes your period, it is effected by your period. What causes your period and what causes trans women's periods is the same thing: the endocrine system.
HRT changes the sex of your endocrine system. Feminizing HRT makes it a female endocrine system, giving us a 28-day hormone cycle just like cis women. At the end of that cycle, the hypothalamus floods the body with prostaglandins. Those are what cause all but one of the period symptoms, because they make muscles inflame and contract. They are what make the uterus shed its lining, they are what cause intestinal cramps, they are what cause body aches, they are what cause headaches and migraines. The only period symptom not causes by the release of prostaglandins throughout the body is depression, and that is caused by your endocrine system simply not processing as much estrogen and from simply feeling like shit.
So, the only symptoms trans women don't get every 28 days is menstrual cramps, because yes we do not menstruate since we don't have uteruses. But migraines, depression, body aches, intestinal cramps, and the infamous "period shits" don't exactly add up to us having any better of a time. Except we have to pretend that we're fine and nothing is different because no one believes that we get periods, not even cis women.
"But you can't call it a period then because that refers to MENSTRUATION!" is another one I hear all the time. This is incorrect. You use the word "period" instead of just "menstruation" because it doesn't just refer to menstruation. It refers to a period at the end of the hormone cycle where we experience a host of symptoms. And not all cis women experience all of the symptoms that encompass the period. Not all cis women get migraines, or body aches, or have severe depression. If a cis woman gets a hysterectomy she doesn't menstruate either! In that instance she experiences an identical period to what trans women experience. Yet, I doubt you'd insist that cis women who've had hysterectomies don't have periods.
Oh, another thing that I personally discovered after bottom surgery: vaginal odor changes for trans women during our periods too. I was not expecting that because I always thought it was just from menstruation. But nope, the ph levels of a trans woman's vagina are the same of as a cis woman's vagina, and it changes during our periods just the same.
I don't mean to distract from the very important message of this post, but I'm worried trans women may not know this because even a lot of cis women don't: if your period comes with severe depression, that's not normal or healthy, that's a medical issue. A little bit of depression and mood swings are normal, but if it's severe or debilitating? That's probably Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder. It sucks but it's treatable.
I thought it was normal for years to feel that way, and I don't want anybody else to suffer like I did. Trans women are likely even more vulnerable to having untreated PMDD due to a combination of difficulty accessing healthcare and the fact that cis women are refusing to share the period wisdom. (I'm not a cis woman btw, just an enby with a uterus and estrogen-dominant endocrine system.) (I'm also making the assumption that trans and cis women have equal probabilities of getting PMDD, but who knows really? I doubt anyone's ever studied it.)
I just want you to know this in case it helps anybody. Your period isn't supposed to make you feel like you're gonna die every month, and if it does, there are ways to mitigate that.
I always welcome people talking about this. When I made this post I was one of those women who thought the severe depression every month was normal. Another person using this post to talk about PMDD a few days later is how I learned about it and that I probably have it. Now I've seen my doctor about it and we're working on figuring out a treatment that works for me.
Did not doubt the existence of a hormonal cycle / period in transgender women, as I've seen many talk about it, but still wanted to look more into it.
While there's not much on it - something that will hopefully change! - there has been one study done that found that there is a hormonal cycle that trans women on HRT can (specifying can because tons of periods are wonky per person, who knows what folks will go through) go through that causes many symptoms "associated with the luteal phase in cisgender women".
The luteal phase is "the second half of the menstrual cycle". For people who go through menstruation, that's the part where you're sore and hungry all the time and generally annoyed (PMS symptoms).
Currently it's mostly left to anecdotal evidence - which does nothing to invalidate the experiences, everything was purely anecdotal once! - but there's likely still plenty of research being done on the topic. Hopefully we'll have some more news as time goes on!
Definitely interesting!
Links: The study mentioned A non-medical article discussing the topic An article from medicalnewstoday talking about it
Something that a lot of people don't know is that the environment can cause genes to switch on and off. Having an X chromosome instead of a Y chromosome turns some stuff on and other stuff off, but the stuff is still THERE. Ask any sex educator who gets asked "why do men have nipples?" dozens of times a year. Because nipples aren't on the X chromosome. It's the switch that turns on boobs that's on the X chromosome.
The reason transition is possible is because hormones are part of that environment. The reason a trans woman on estrogen can grow breasts is because estrogen flicks that switch. She already had the genes to grow breasts. So while I wasn't aware that trans women had a menstrual cycle it COMPLETELY makes sense to me that going on estrogen would turn the menstrual cycle on. Why wouldn't it? It's what hormones DO. That's their role.
Endometriosis is endometrial tissue that grows outside of the uterus, which means it doesn't go away with a hysterectomy. So you don't need a uterus to have it. Endometriosis research is in its infancy and only gaining more momentum now, but I bet there's plenty of trans women out there who have it too and have no idea because they think they have bowel issues instead (endo often grows on the bowels), or other weird symptoms they can't identify. Get on the floor on your stomach and try to do a backbend, see how it feels in your lower abdomen. When my endo was stage 4, before it got cut out, I felt a really strong and somewhat unpleasant stretch down there because my organs were alll adhered together and it didn't go away until I had the laparoscopy. Endometriosis is basically superglue around the pelvis, it makes stuff stick together instead of sliding around and you can feel ot when you try to move those organs around through a backbend.
100% there are trans women out there with endo and PMDD.
